February 4, 2025

5 Blockchain Governance Trends to Look For in 2025

EMURGO

5-Blockchain-Governance-Trends-in-2025

The blockchain industry is entering a new phase in 2025, with more focus and emphasis placed on decentralized governance, and other trending narratives. 

Having a few core developers manage and maintain the activities of a blockchain network can pose an increasing vulnerability as it experiences increased user activity and is constantly being built upon by more decentralized applications. 

To mitigate these risks, a decentralized blockchain protocol aims to become more widely distributed in its technical infrastructure and decision-making processes, with more nodes securing the network and more of its community of users having a prominent voice in governance-related matters. 

This is where a blockchain network’s governance structure plays an essential role in providing a transparent solution by enabling the community to run and decide how the network should function.

For the Cardano network and ecosystem, the recent implementation of the Plomin hard fork unlocked full on-chain decentralization features and governance actions for DReps and the community.

In this blog, we’ll further discuss 5 trending topics regarding decentralized blockchain governance for this year.

Key Takeaways

  • In 2025, blockchain governance is expected to become an increasing focus.
  • Key trends include stakeholder voting, increased community participation, formal governance processes and tools, more elections, and a growing diversity of developers.
  • Cardano’s recent Plomin hard fork enables on-chain governance and voting for DReps and governance actions. Community members can submit governance actions, delegate voting power to DReps, and more.
  • Intersect, a member-based organization, supports formal governance processes and community-led initiatives in the Cardano ecosystem.
  • Tools like Cardano GovTool enhance community participation and transparency in governance.

Blockchain Governance Trends

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  • Stakeholder Voting Rights

One of the most common models for on-chain governance is enabling voting by the blockchain network’s nodes, validators, and other key community stakeholders. In a decentralized blockchain, anyone can participate and run a node (server) or validator to help secure and distribute the network’s reach. By possessing an updated copy of the blockchain’s transaction data and supporting the validation of user transactions, nodes serve a valuable purpose in securing the network.

Since these nodes have to be set up, maintained, and updated by community participants interested in the ecosystem, the node operators make up a natural voting block regarding governance. They have a vested interest in the longevity of the blockchain and are also further incentivized by the protocol’s rewards. 

Cardano’s proof-of-stake blockchain (PoS) refers to these nodes as validators or stake pools and stake pool operators (SPOs) that administer them. Any community member can decide to join a stake pool of their choosing or set up a stake pool of their own.

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With the signing of the Cardano Constitution in December 2024 and the Plomin hard fork, on-chain voting for Cardano governance actions is enabled for Cardano community stakeholders such as DReps and SPOs. DReps are one of the three primary governing bodies in Cardano’s future governance structure, providing a mechanism for community-driven decision-making for those who delegate their voting power to them. These DReps have the right to vote on proposals and governance actions submitted by the Cardano community.  As another core governing body on the Cardano network, SPOs also represent the community segment that supports the network’s infrastructure by securing it through the ADA delegated to their pools and voting on certain initiatives. 

  • Increased Accessibility to Governance Participation 

A blockchain’s reach and potential are built upon its community of users and their participation in the activity. If more users are interested in a particular network and developers are actively building and maintaining applications, this attracts more potential new users and developers. 

While it may be hard to distinguish and specify a specific metric to quantify a single blockchain community, the biggest tend to be the ones with the largest market capitalization, number of wallet addresses, number of native dApps and users, and developer activity on GitHub, among others.

With the transition towards decentralized governance, there has been a push to have the community of any given blockchain play a more active role in governance. This group represents the largest block in any ecosystem, and they must have a voice in shaping a network’s future, similar to citizens being able to vote in national elections.

A key feature of Cardano’s decentralized governance model is Governance Actions or proposals that anyone in the Cardano community can submit. Through the integration of the Plomin hard fork, community members can create governance actions to deliver community-led changes. To initiate a proposal, they must make a small ADA deposit, which is fully refunded after voting ends.

In Cardano, community members can also participate in governance by delegating their voting power to a DRep, abstaining from a proposal vote, or submitting a vote of no-confidence through their Yoroi Wallet interface. 

  • Implementation of Formal Governance Processes and Tools

Another trend that can accelerate in 2025 is formalizing the governance process. Today, many of the blockchains that are experimenting with governance have looser rules regarding the process. This creates confusion and a sense that there is an inner circle “in the know,” with outsiders unable to access this information.

This is why creating more transparent and fairer rules for a governance model is imperative to ensure trust in the community. 

In Cardano, Intersect is a member-based organization open to anyone who supports the formal implementation of various community-led initiatives focused on governance. With Committees and Working Groups, community members can join Intersect and these open groups, helping to work on tasks and goals that further strengthen Cardano’s governance.

For tools, Cardano GovTool has also been released to allow the community to easily connect their wallets and explore and govern Cardano through a unified dashboard. Furthermore, DReps and the community have a say in ratifying the signed version of the Cardano Constitution which is ongoing.

Read more: Explaining Intersect’s Committees and Working Groups 

  • More Elections

Another essential feature of a governance model is elections. The people in charge of a nation or network must be accountable to the community and ensure a fair and transparent process. Thus, elections are also an important part of the governance discussion. 

Blockchains are globally distributed information systems connecting people from many countries and cultures. This creates unique challenges in making clear who can be elected and who can vote. 

In Cardano, as mentioned above, users can utilize their Yoroi Wallet to select which DRep they would like to delegate their voting power. Last year, Intersect also held elections for positions in its Committees and two new non-executive directors to join its Governing Board, with more elections on the way completed through its Member Portal.

Anyone can register to become a DRep through the GovTools site.

  • Growing Diversity of Developers

To take a blockchain network’s decentralization to the next step, there needs to be a large and expanding number of teams from various parts of the ecosystem working on the protocol. 

Things like new node implementations, wallet upgrades, Layer-2s, and other network-related improvements need to come from interested developers, users, and other projects. Discussing who can propose these changes and how they should be adopted is one of the many vital items a governance model must decide. As the ones building and maintaining the network, developers have insights into ideas for the network and a proper governance structure gives them the resources they need.

To better governance in Cardano, Intersect delivers grants for specific projects and initiatives about the continuity and development of the Cardano network. Its governance tools on GovTools are fully open-sourced with an Apache 2.0 license to ensure that the tools are owned and maintained by the Cardano community itself through Intersect. Developers can also submit feedback on bugs and ideas via the feedback button on GovTools, join the Intersect Governance Tools Working Groups, and contribute directly to the open repositories.

Download Yoroi Wallet to Get Started with Cardano Governance

Download Yoroi Wallet

Yoroi Wallet is an open-source Cardano light wallet developed by EMURGO. With mobile and desktop versions available for download, users can get quick access to participating in Cardano blockchain governance including delegating to a Delegated Representative (DRep) and voting.

To download Yoroi and get more information, visit here.

To receive more content on Cardano governance, follow EMURGO on X and LinkedIn.

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Disclaimer 

You should not construe any such information or other material as legal, tax, investment, financial, or other advice. Nothing contained herein shall constitute a solicitation, recommendation, endorsement, or offer by EMURGO to invest.

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